May the Best Diva Win: Inside the Gaga-Katy-Miley-Lorde Race

Lady Gaga's "Artpop" comes out Tuesday, sending the rivalry into high gear

We've seen pop music's leading ladies sing, dance, twerk and tweet. Now watch them battle.

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Katy Perry has been stealing the spotlight from Lady Gaga.
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This year's album-release schedule pits pop's biggest female artists against each other on the charts as the holiday season approaches, after male stars like Daft Punk, Justin Timberlake and Kanye West squared off during the first part of the year.

Lady Gaga's fourth studio album, "Artpop," comes out Tuesday, but so far this year the 27-year-old star—known for provocative stunts like donning a dress made of raw meat—has been eclipsed by the competition. Katy Perry's Twitter following (47 million) surpassed Gaga's this summer (40 million). Miley Cyrus, 20, stole the show with a raunchy performance at the MTV Video Music Awards in August; based on buzz the next day, you'd hardly know Gaga was part of the show.

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17-year-old New Zealander Lorde, pictured, Katy Perry, Miley Cyrus and Lady Gaga are competing for the same audience with new CDs.
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Even 17-year-old New Zealand newcomer Lorde has sold more singles this year than Lady Gaga, who has already released two new tracks ahead of the "Artpop" debut. (Lorde's hit single "Royals" was piped in before New York City's mayor-elect Bill de Blasio gave his victory speech Tuesday.)

Adding to the intrigue, Gaga, whose real name is Stefani Germanotta, parted ways with her longtime manager, Troy Carter, this week, raising questions about how the record will fare without the figure who guided her career to its early highs.

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Gaga's new album comes out next week.
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Despite their shared mass appeal, these female stars differ in their sounds, creative approaches and marketing tactics. And they don't appreciate being compared with each other, according to some of their representatives.

But their sounds are colliding as all three draw from a widening range of genres including disco, hip-hop and rock—appealing to what Tom Corson, president of Sony Corp.'s RCA Records., calls the"playlist generation," whose members aren't confined by traditional radio formats.

As download sales of Ms. Perry's single "Roar" handily surpassed sales of Gaga's track "Applause" this summer, the blogosphere declared Ms. Perry pop's new champion. Last month, just before releasing the second single from "Artpop," Gaga expressed her frustration on Twitter, echoing her critics and responding to each attack.

"APPLAUSE didn't DEBUT AT #1! KATY IS BETTER THAN HER!"" she posted, adding: "I write for the music, not for the charts." On Twitter, she cited the accusation that "LADY GAGA IS A REDUCTIVE MADONNA COPY!" and responded: "#ImNotSorry."

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Katy Perry
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Ms. Perry's co-manager, Martin Kirkup, said he didn't "regard Katy as battling it out with anyone."

But record companies are watching the competition closely. Ms. Perry has sold 4.7 million albums to date, including nearly 469,000 copies of her latest, "Prism." Ms. Cyrus has sold 3.8 million albums over her career and 401,000 copies of her latest record, "Bangerz," along with more than six million digital tracks this year. Gaga, with 8.8 million total records sold, sold more than 200,000 downloads of her song featuring R. Kelly, "Do What U Want," released late last month, and 1.7 million downloads of "Applause" since its release in August, according to Nielsen SoundScan.

After a decade of steep declines, annual music-industry revenue has stabilized over the past two years, settling at about $7 billion, with revenue from streaming services accounting for $1 billion of the pie last year, according to the Recording Industry Association of America, which hasn't released its 2013 results.

Ms. Cyrus, the daughter of country singer Billy Ray Cyrus who rose to fame as the teen star of Disney's Hannah Montana, doesn't take herself too seriously, said Mr. Corson, president of her label, RCA. She's been "having fun" sharing her lifestyle, he said, which has included cursing in interviews, visiting strip clubs and amassing piercings and tattoos, while incorporating hip-hop beats into her music.

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Miley Cyrus
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"It's a form of expression and emancipation," said Mr. Corson, adding that the label is supporting her "agenda" because it's "working."

On the other hand, the 29-year-old Ms. Perry—who started as a gospel singer in Santa Barbara, Calif., and recently divorced Russell Brand, the louche British comedian—has been amassing devotees with a down-the-middle, girl-next-door vibe, recently advising female artists showing too much skin to "put it away."

Gaga, a New York Catholic-school graduate whose 2012 world tour brought in $161 million, is known for her elaborate, theatrical costumes and espouses empowerment and art, the subject of her new album.

To promote "Artpop," she performed a new track, "Dope," at the YouTube Music Awards Sunday, crying as she sang. That followed a string of shows in Europe this fall including one at which she stripped completely naked. Gaga will answer fan questions Friday at a "Town Hall" event on Sirius XM Radio and will host "Saturday Night Live" Nov. 16.

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Lady Gaga
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An accomplished musician who plays piano and composes most of her own songs, Gaga plots visual performance aspects as she writes, according to her producer, Paul Blair, aka DJ White Shadow. Ms. Perry writes her own songs, too, according to her camp, though often in collaboration with hitmakers Dr. Luke and Max Martin. Ms. Cyrus leads the charge when it comes to selecting which producers and songwriters to work with, Mr. Corson said.

Steve Berman, vice chairman at Gaga's label, Interscope Records, a division of Vivendi SA's Universal Music Group, said the "Artpop" marketing campaign has faced some challenges. The team had to scramble to release her "Applause" video before they were ready, after an imperfect version of song was leaked in August. The reason: Gaga is "so sensitive" to making sure her music is presented with the right imagery, and to her core fans first, he said. Meantime, Interscope has been tinkering with the rest of album over the past five to six weeks, and Gaga has been "open to creative input." Mr. Berman declined to comment on Gaga's fallout with Mr. Carter.

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Marketing consultant Jackie Huba, author of the book "Monster Loyalty: How Lady Gaga Turns Followers into Fanatics," said the singer's slide from the spotlight started when she injured her hip earlier this year, canceled the remainder of her "Born This Way" tour and disappeared for several months without so much as a tweet.

But Ms. Huba said that while Gaga's latest material may be impressing mass audiences less, the consultant's research shows that Gaga is still effectively engaging the core fans. Recently, for example, Gaga allowed fans camped out in front of her studio to use their Twitter feeds to break the news of all the song titles on "Artpop." She has also been using symbolism in her videos and performances that purportedly will go over the heads of anyone but Gaga superfans, who call themselves "Little Monsters."

Among them: the voices shouting "Lady Gaga is over!" didn't come from the live audience but were piped in to show the criticism artists face, she wrote. Another inside reference: Lady Gaga's barely there seashell bikini was a nod to Botticelli's painting "The Birth of Venus," meant to symbolize her rebirth after undergoing hip surgery earlier this year, according to Ms. Huba.

Music-industry consultant Jeff Pollack said that in the end, marketing hype doesn't matter that much: the diva with the best music wins. "Great songs trump everything," said Mr. Pollack. "At the end of the day, it's not what you wear that matters as much as how good your latest single is."

Corrections & Amplifications Jackie Huba is the author of "Monster Loyalty: How Lady Gaga Turns Followers into Fanatics." An earlier version of this article incorrectly said Ms. Huba's book was called "Monster Business: Loyalty Lessons from Lady Gaga." In addition, the MTV Video Music Awards took place in August. The article incorrectly said the awards show happened in September.

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